No Minelabs here

[Allen in MT]

Went to the GPAA Gold Show in Spokane WA today, was real slow. Maybe 60 people at the door when they opened. No Minelab dealers anywhere. Saw Kevin behind the GPAA booth. No gold tables set up, a couple pieces here and there.

Guess the economy and fuel prices have everyone staying close to home.

[Lve2fsh]

I went to the one in Vegas and didn't see a minelab setup either. Also couldn't find anything to buy except Chris's book which he signed for me.

[homefire]

Gas and they want so much for a space it's crazy.

The rock Shows here they want a ton just for a 10ft space.

[Nugget Shooter]

We currently can not get detectors... All gold detectors are on back order. Gold rush overseas again and they are being grabbed up and shipped out of the USA. I have nothing in stock and a bit flustered over it happening again! Went through this same thing 2 years back and OH YEAH Minelab is making the $$$$, but the US market is unfairly suffering and local folks can not get detectors. Not sure what can be done and I am patiently awaiting delivery.... some day.

[Allen in MT]

We currently can not get detectors... All gold detectors are on back order. Gold rush overseas again and they are being grabbed up and shipped out of the USA. I have nothing in stock and a bit flustered over it happening again! Went through this same thing 2 years back and OH YEAH Minelab is making the $$$$, but the US market is unfairly suffering and local folks can not get detectors. Not sure what can be done and I am patiently awaiting delivery.... some day.

I hear you Bill, I get acouple of calls a week now. I have been told not to call in and ask about them, they will call us and let us no when they are in. Alot of foreigners who can't speak much english also calling.

[Nugget Shooter]

Yeah I hear you I have a prepay from a local customer waiting on a detector righ now and empty shelves. Oh and the calls... try 50 or more a week

[AuTSaurus]

Bill,

Just curious, I haven't heard where the new rush is, overseas. Do you know where?

Greg

[garimpo]

I can tell you one thing for sure it ain't here in my neck of the woods

[Nugget Shooter]

I believe Africa....

[AuTSaurus]

Thanks Bill,...

I hear ya, Garimpo, please pass the kleenex!

Greg

[Lve2fsh]

So slightly used 5000's should go for more than they originally cost?

Not that I want to sell mine.

[scarecrow]

i dont see anymore new 5000 on ebay anymore maybe i will list mine for 7k :hahaha:

[Goldfinger]

All you guys supported Minelab long before they started finding gold in Africa. You'd think loyalty would mean something but I guess not.

Steve

[Nugget Shooter]

Hi Steve, Minelab it trying very hard to get a handle on things, but these buyers are smart and order one or two detectors from dealers across the country and the factory can not keep up with demand and there is no legal way to stop it if they order in the US and have the detector shipped to a US address. After they get the detector they ship it out....

Minelab is trying to get a handle, but....

Truth is it will likely just have to run it's course...

[Hoser John]

Africa is it and quite a few buds there and mining for DIAMONDS AND GOLD doing whatever ya want is definately better than US bs and constant harrasment-tons a au 2 u 2 -John

[fredmason]

I wonder what happened to all the Minelabs and coils sold during the Sudan Rush...and apparently they still don't get the idea that almost any gold detector will find the easy stuff...it does not have to be a Minelab 5000

fred

[garimpo]

Yes Minelab makes the best gold detector in the world but business is business.....for example if they normally

sell 50 GPX 5000 a month in the USA but all of a sudden they can sell 500 a month in Africa (?) and double the

price what looks better to the bottom line as they say......meantime Loyalty is causing them to cry all the way

to the bank....

[garimpo]

For anybody thinking about joining the gold rush in Africa a few things should first be considered....

OBO, Central African Republic – Deep in the jungle, this small, remote Central African village is farther from the coast than any point on the continent. It's also where three international armies have zeroed in on Joseph Kony, one of the world's most wanted warlords.

Obo was the first place in the Central African Republic that Kony's Lord's Resistance Army attacked in 2008; today, it's one of four forward operating locations where U.S. special forces have paired up with local troops and Ugandan soldiers to seek out Kony, who is believed likely to be hiding out in the rugged terrain northwest of the town. For seven years he has been wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity after his forces cut a wide and bloody swath across several central African nations with rapes, abductions and killings.

Part of the LRA's success in eluding government forces has been its ability to slip back and forth over the porous borders of the Central African Republic, South Sudan and Congo. But since late last year, U.S. forces have been providing intelligence, looking at patterns of movement, and setting up better communications to link the countries' forces together so that they can better track the guerrilla force.

Sent by President Barack Obama at the end of 2011, the 100 U.S. soldiers are split up about 15 to 30 per base, bringing in American technology and experience to assist local forces.

Exact details on specific improvements that the American forces have brought to the table, however, are classified, to avoid giving Kony the ability to take countermeasures.

"We don't necessarily go and track into the bush but what we do is we incorporate our experiences with the partner nation's experiences to come up with the right solution to go out and hopefully solve this LRA problem," said Gregory, a 29-year-old captain from Texas, who would only give his first name in accordance with security guidelines.

The U.S. troops also receive reports from local hunters and others that they help analyze together with surveillance information.

"It's very easy to blame everything on the LRA but there are other players in the region — there are poachers, there are bandits, and we have to sift that to filter what is LRA," he said.

Central African Republic soldiers largely conduct security operations in and around the town, while Ugandan soldiers, who have been in the country since 2010, conduct longer-range patrols looking for Kony and his men.

Since January, they have killed seven LRA fighters in the area and captured one, while rescuing 15 people abducted by the group including five children, said their local commander, Col. Joseph Balikuddembe.

There has been no contact with the LRA since March, however, according to Ugandan Army spokesman Col. Felix Kulayigye, who said the LRA now is in survival mode. The LRA is thought to today number only around 150 to 300 die-hard fighters.

"They're hiding," he said. "They are not capable of doing."

But with Kony still around, there are wide ranging-fears that the LRA will be able to rebuild.

"There's periods of time when the LRA will lie low when the military pressure is too high or where there's a threat that they don't understand such as the American intervention," said Matthew Brubacher, a political affairs officer with the U.N.'s mission in Congo, who was also an International Criminal Court investigator on the Kony case for five years.

"But then after a while after they figure it out, if they have the opportunity they'll try to come back, so it's just a matter of time they'll try to come back. Kony always said 'if I have only 10 men, I can always rebuild the force."

Right now, expectations are high of the Americans serving in Obo and Djema in the Central African Republic, as well as those in Dungu in Congo and Nzara in South Sudan.

"For all the communities, the U.S. bases in Obo and Djema means one, Kony will be arrested, and two, there will be a lot of money for programs, humanitarian programs," said Sabine Jiekak of the Italian humanitarian aid agency Coopi.

Central African Republic Deputy Defense Minister Jean Francis Bozize said it's been difficult for the poor country's small military to deal with Kony in the southeast as well as several other militant groups in the north.

An African Union mission expected to begin later this year should help expedite the cross-border pursuit of the LRA.

In the meantime, Bozize said the American forces could make a big difference.

"The involvement of U.S. forces with their assistance in providing information and intelligence will allow for all forces to operate from the same base-level of intelligence ... (giving) better coordination with better results," he told reporters in the capital, Bangui.

But the military mission is not a simple one.

How do you find small groups of seasoned fighters hidden deep in the jungle, who have eluded authorities for decades? How do you prevent brutal reprisal attacks on civilians? How can you bring together several countries' troops to cooperate on cross-border pursuits?

The LRA usually attacks late at night, then melts back away into the jungle. Seasoned bush fighters, they employ many techniques to elude pursuit — walking along rocks or along streams to avoid leaving tracks, for example, and sometimes even marching backward to fool trackers.

Kony has reportedly stopped using radios and satellite phones for communications, instead relying on an elaborate system involving runners and multiple rendezvous points.

Key to his capture is good information from local residents — which they will only give when they can be sure of their own safety, according to American commanders.

"The population have to believe that they are secure and once they believe they are secure from the LRA, you start to deny the LRA the opportunity to attack villages to get people, to get food, to get medicine," Gen. Carter Ham, the head of U.S. Africa Command, told reporters in Stuttgart.

That may take some time in Obo, a town of some 15,000 where around 3,500 people have sought refuge to escape LRA violence in the area.

Rural farmers and others stick to within 5 kilometers (3 miles) of the village for safety — originally the area that Central African Republic soldiers were able to patrol but now more a rule of thumb followed by the locals.

They've started recently to venture out farther, emboldened by the presence of the Ugandans and Americans to help the government forces, but are too nervous to stray too wide from the safety of the village.

"They're still scared, they're still wary because Joseph Kony is still out there," said Mayor Joseph Kpioyssrani, looking at the jungle behind him.

Kony's LRA sprung up in 1986 as a rebel movement among the Acholi people in northern Uganda to fight against the Kampala government, but has for decades been leading its violent campaign without any clear political ideology.

Emmanuel Daba, 33, was one of 76 people abducted in the first LRA raid on Obo in 2008 and forced to fight for the guerrillas for two years before managing to escape.

"We were trained to kill — forced to kill — otherwise we'd be killed ourselves," he said outside the tiny radio station where he now works broadcasting messages to try and encourage others with the LRA to defect or escape. "I still have dreams — nightmares."

This year, the U.S. Defense Department is committing $35 million to efforts to find and fight Kony.

Since 2008, the U.S. State Department has sent some $50 million in funds to support the Ugandan military's logistics and non-lethal operations against the LRA, including contracting two transport helicopters to ferry troops and supplies. Another $500 million has been given over that time for the broader northern Uganda recovery effort in the aftermath of Kony's presence there.

In Stuttgart, Ham keeps a "Kony 2012" poster hanging on his office door.

Though he isn't committing to the goal of the viral YouTube campaign to see Kony neutralized by the end of the year, he does define success as either capturing or killing the LRA leader eventually.

"I'm confident that the mission will be successful, but I can't give you a timeline when that's going to occur..." Ham said. "It is one of those organizations that if you remove the senior leader and the small number of those who surround him, I believe this is one of those organizations that will not be able to regenerate."

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/04/29/us-special-forces-help-in-hunt-for-warlord-kony303902/#ixzz1tYf4qfJr

[Rimshot]

spam again?

[oredigger62]

Yes it is....throw it out! !!

[DolanDave]

Lots of minelabs gpx 5000 on ebay buy it now and ship out in 24 hrs

[GlennM]

Caveat Emptor - buyer beware.

If you're not buying from a licensed dealer, or know/can trace Tue lineage of the one you're buying back to one, you're likely to get the shaft... and that's the only good part on some of those.

[Nugget Shooter]

Lots of minelabs gpx 5000 on ebay buy it now and ship out in 24 hrs

I have them in stock at my store guys this is a very old post from April during the crunch.... You get a much better deal through my store on any new Minelab than eBay!

[oredigger62]

And much better customer service too....

[Nugget Shooter]

Yup and thanks OD!.... Call me last for the best deal even if the other dealer is offering a pile of "extras" you do really want not need listed with "retail" price as a "value"

I let the customer make the deal with me as often folks buying already have owned several detectors and all the extra trinkets are not really needed so with me you can add coils etc. that you want or need to better outfit yourself.

Buy from me, you deal with me, and are trained by me FWIW.... Bill